Solid mineral formations composed of methane molecules caged in a lattice of water molecules (clathrates) are found in marine sediments around the world under conditions where dissolved methane is at the saturation point, hydrostatic pressures are sufficiently high, and water temperatures are low. Because of the exquisite temperature-pressure sensitivity of the clathrate structure (they spontaneously breakdown to release gaseous methane when brought to the sea surface or to shallower water depths) as well as their global abundance, this team of investigators will conduct studies to determine what happens after methane is released from the clathrate structure and rises into the marine water column. Their research goals are (1) to trace the source and determine methane inventory and flux to the water column, (2) to determine the fate of this methane in the water column, and (3) to determine relationships between methane inventories and oxidation rates with regional geophysical features. As participants in a much larger international effort studying methane clathrates in the Cascadia accretionary Prism off the coast of Oregon, these investigators will be carrying out studies that promise to relate the occurrence of these seafloor features to the bigger picture of the cycling of carbon in the sea and to the role of the ocean in regulating methane and carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere.
